


Non-Chicken

by afteriwake



Category: CSI: Miami
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-19
Updated: 2012-09-19
Packaged: 2017-11-14 15:27:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/516823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afteriwake/pseuds/afteriwake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Calleigh goes to talk to Ryan after he helped her work some things out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Non-Chicken

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Confessions](https://archiveofourown.org/works/515369) by [afteriwake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/afteriwake/pseuds/afteriwake). 



He was surprised to feel two arms wrap around his neck, a female body press up against his back, and blonde hair fall over his shoulder. "Not that I don't mind the hug, but..."

"Thank you," Calleigh said. "You know, for coming over to the bar last night."

"Hey, you know I would have gone with you in the first place if I could have."

"I know." She let go of him and sat down on a stool next to him. "But seriously. I think I was holding all that in for way too long."

"It's good you got it out." He paused in what he was doing. "Why a hug?"

"What?"

"Why did you give me a hug? You never really do anything like that."

She shrugged lightly. "You hugged me last night, I'm hugging you today."

"Ah," he said, nodding. "That makes perfect Calleigh sense."

She smacked his shoulder lightly. "Stop it, Ryan, or next time I'll actually hit you."

"See, _that's_ the Calleigh I know and love," he said. He happened to be watching her face and saw the expression change. "What?"

"You know, you've never really said that to me like that before. I mean, you usually go 'that's the Calleigh I know' and leave it at that."

"Yeah, well, I ended up spending most of the night in your apartment listening to you get everything out of your system. You have to care about a person to be able to do that."

She grinned. "So you _do_ care about me."

"I thought we established that last night, along with Jake and Peter being idiots and me being a chicken." He had very carefully chosen to leave Hagen out at that point.

"Yeah, well, you are. And technically you used Natalia, so you're a user, too."

"Ha. I'd only be a user if the sole purpose of asking her out was to piss Delko off. But it wasn't."

"Really," Calleigh said. "So what was the other reason?"

"Reasons. One was because I liked her." He paused for a second. He would have told her the second reason the night before, but she was drunk, and... "Second one was because I wanted to make you jealous and hoped you'd make a move."

She looked at him. "Why?"

"Because I am no good at anything relating to dating. Look at how my last girlfriend continues to walk all over me."

Her eyes widened. "So you and Erica _were_ dating!" she said.

"Can we not bring her up? Please? At least by name?" He shook his head. "I was just afraid I'd screw things up with you."

She felt a knot in her stomach loosen. This, other than last night, was the most open Ryan had ever been with her. She felt hit with a lot of emotions at once: hope, surprise, happiness, fear, worry, on top of it all, she felt touched that he _was_ finally telling her. "I don't think you could do that." He looked at her. "All right. I don't think you could do that _much_."

"So...now what?" he asked. "If I were to ask you out would you shoot me down?"

"I can guarantee that over dinner I'd stop calling you a chicken," she said with a grin.

"Oh, so now you're deciding what kind of date we're going to have."

"I'm a decisive kind of girl," she said, getting off the stool. "Pick a time and place and I'll be there."

"Tonight. And I don't know where, but we can figure that out."

"After shift, then." She walked out of the lab, heading towards the locker room with a grin on her face. This was unexpected, so surprise was still there, but she was mostly happy about the turn of events. Maybe she needed to get drunk more often when Ryan was around...


End file.
